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Platte River Networks (PRN) has managed Clinton’s server since June 2013. Furthermore, PRN subcontracted with Datto, Inc. to make periodic back-ups of the server’s data. It has been claimed that Clinton Executive Service Corp. (CESC), the Clinton family company that hired PRN in June 2013, always made clear that there should be a 30-day deletion policy for the Datto back-up of the server. That means that any deleted email would be permanently deleted after 30 days.

However, an August 18, 2015 email from one PRN employee, Paul Combetta, to another, Bill Thornton, suggests the implementation of this policy actually happened later. Combetta believes that CESC directed PRN to reduce the length of time backups, but “this was all phone comms [communications].”

Thorton replies the next day. The email has the subject heading “CESC Datto.” He writes, “Any chance you found an old email with their directive to cut the backup back in Oct-Feb. I know they had you cut it once in Oct-Nov, then again to 30 days in Feb-ish.” (Presumably this refers to October 2014 through February 2015.)

Paul Combetta (left) and Bill Thornton (right) are the two PRN employees with access to the Clinton server. (Credit: public domain)

Thornton continues, “If we had that email, then we’re golden. … Wondering how we can sneak an email in now after the fact asking them when they told us to cut the backups and have them confirm it for our records. Starting to think this whole thing really is covering up some shady shit. I just think if we have it in writing that they [CESC] told us to cut the backups, and we can go public with our statement saying we have had backups since day one, then we were told to trim to 30 days, it would make us look a WHOLE LOT better.” (Politico, 10/6/2015) (McClatchy Newspapers, 10/6/2015) (US Congress, 9/12/2016) (The New York Post, 9/18/2016)

Combetta replies, “I’ll look again, but I’m almost positive we don’t have anything about the 60 day cut. … It’s up to lawyer crap now, so just sit back and enjoy the silly headlines.”

Then, seemingly without any prompting, Combetta makes some comments supportive of Clinton’s position in her email controversy: “It wasn’t the law to be required to use government email servers at the State Department, believe it or not. Colin Powell used an AOL address for communicating with his staff, believe it or not.” (Daily Caller, 9/14/2016)

It’s not clear when the deletion policy for the Datto back-up of the server was instituted or changed. But if these employees are correct, the change would have come after Clinton was formally asked to hand over all her emails, which took place in October 2014.

Clinton’s campaign has acknowledged “that there was an attempt to wipe [Clinton’s private] server before it was turned over last week to the FBI. But two sources with direct knowledge of the investigation told NBC News… that the [FBI] may be able to recover at least some data.” (NBC News, 8/19/2015)

Michael Hayden, who was appointed director of the NSA by President Bill Clinton and then director of the CIA by President George W. Bush, says that Hillary Clinton’s “original sin is actually co-mingling [her] two accounts and not using a government e-mail server. […] [P]ut legality aside just for a second, it’s stupid and dangerous. […] Dangerous to her and to the Republic and to American secrets. But… I don’t even think it was legal. That has to be against policy. Look, most folks like me, I never had a smart phone until I left government because of the sensitivity of the information I would put on there even if it were unclassified.” (MSNBC, 8/19/2015)

Platte River Networks is a small Colorado-based technology company, and they managed Clinton’s server from mid-2013 to early August 2015. They had never had a federal government contract and did not work for political campaigns. Nearly all their clients are local businesses. David DeCamillis, the company’s vice president of sales, says that if they’d had any clue what might have resulted from accepting the contract, “we would never have taken it on.” (The Washington Post, 8/19/2016)

Furthermore, Cindy McGovern, a Defense Department spokesperson, says that Platte River “is not cleared” to have access to classified material. (Business Insider, 8/17/2015)

Cybersecurity expert Alex McGeorge believes that if classified information was mishandled, the onus is on Clinton, not on the company. “The fact that Platte River is not a cleared contractor is largely irrelevant, [since] they were handling what should have been unclassified email. That classified email may have been received by a server under their control is troubling, and they may have been less equipped to deal with it, but it is ultimately not their fault.” (Business Insider, 8/19/2016)

She contradicts her own State Department’s inspector general Steve Linick by reiterating that she never sent or received classified material. She says, “what I did was legally permitted.” She calls the current controversy nothing more than a ‘disagreement between agencies.” (The Guardian, 8/19/2015)

Clinton checks her BlackBerry next to South Korea’s foreign minister in Busan, South Korea, on November 30, 2011. (Credit: Saul Loeb / The Associated Press)

Furthermore, when Clinton aides Cheryl Mills and Huma Abedin left the State Department, their BlackBerrys were likely destroyed after they were returned to the government, since they were outdated models by that time. (Judicial Watch, 8/19/2015)

David Kendall (right) and Katherine Turner (left) sit behind Clinton during her testimony to the Benghazi committee on October 23, 2015. (Credit: Getty Images)

Lawyer David Kendall tells this to the Senate Homeland Security committee. He adds that both he and his office partner lawyer Katherine Turner had been given security clearances to handle a thumb drive containing some of Clinton’s emails, but he doesn’t say when. His comments don’t clarify if Clinton’s server was wiped or merely erased.

“Wiping” means that new data is written over the old data several times to make sure it can never be recovered. (The Guardian, 8/19/2015)